Imagine one country in AFC was an elite national team for many decades of the likes of France, Germany in the past, Spain etc... We would have seen a 200 goals scorer given how many levels below most Asian teams are. But now AFC is making huge progress with Japan, South Korea, Uzbekistan slowly, etc..
Huh Uzbekistan?
Whats happening there? Never heard of their NT or players beeing good.
They just beat England in the rd of 16 knockout game of the U17 WC. Yesterday was the match I think
And Uzbekistan is basically set to qualify for the next WC with the increase in slots. The AFC getting only 4/5 slots in all the previous WCs basically kept Uzbekistan out of contention from final qualification. But this year they seem an even better team than any time before and with that U17 lot putting on the performance that they have yesterday, they only seem to be getting better with regards to their future chances too
I'd liken them to the Atletico Madrid teams we've seen over the past decade. Physical, defensively solid, potential to launch some solid counter attacks, decent finishing across their attacking ranks. But yes, Imo, its their ability to not give an inch as a collective to their opposition that is their biggest strength. They'll latch onto the opposition when they have the ball and harass them into giving it up basically.
We (India) are clubbed with them, Australia and Syria in the Asian Cup group. Our U17 lads also faced this current U17 team earlier this year in the final round for the U17 WC qualification. They absolutely got our boys mentally done for 75-80 mins out of the 90 with their physical game and got a 1-0 win iirc. So a handful of us on the Indian football sub have followed their recent results and it's not an over exaggeration to say that they're right behind Iran, South Korea and Japan with regards to overall quality.
Lukaku ends his career at the top of this list
49 goals behind Ronaldo and he's already 30, he needs to score more international goals than Bobby Charlton did in his entire career between now and retirement to do that and that's only if Ronaldo doesn't score another one
Ronaldo started scoring more after turning 30, lord Lakaka can easily replicate that
Bringing Bobby Charlton who wasn’t a striker into this is just silly.
It all depends if he can keep up his current form this year. If he plays for 5 more years roughly, it’s 10 goals a year which is a big ask but not out of the question.
Never
Lukaku is 8th in the world?????????????????????????????????
Greatest stat padder of all time.
The craziest thing is that he has around 16 goals in his first 50 games and has been averaging around one goal per game since 2016 now.
Reached 50 goals 4 years ago, is at 83 today. Really impressive
He started off pretty slow considering where he is now.
You laugh, but if he maintains his current trajectory, he will be number one in about five years' time.
Man's got a goals per game ratio that Ali Daei himself would be proud of.
He won't overtake Ronaldo, no chance
I mean, he's just turned 30, and he needs 46 more goals to overtake him. Ronaldo probably can't keep going past the next euros you would have thought, so maybe the target will end up around 50.
Lukaku's averaging about 8 goals per year, and it's not like there are any red hot young Belgian strikers in place to surpass him. So if he keeps going past the next world cup, then there is a small chance; weirder things have happened.
and it's not like there are any red hot young Belgian strikers
Well, there is Openda who is very much on an upwards trajectory. I could see him take Lukaku's starting spot when Lukaku gets a bit older and Openda gets even better. But even in that scenario, Lukaku will definitely still be in the squad and get playing time.
Not everyone keeps scoring regularly until 39 like Ronaldo
Scoring in Europe is much easier than SA due to numerous bad countries, and most of the all time great forwards came from SA (Messi, Pele, R9, Rivaldo, Maradona, Ronaldinho, Suarez, Milito, Forlan) so yeah.
In history
People here don't like to hear it, but it's simply so much easier to get goals now than 20-40 years ago.
is it? 40 years ago scorelines 10:0 were pretty normal, nowadays I would only say it's easier because there are more competitions which means more matches
200+ appearances for a national team as an outfield player is insane.
It's honestly fitting that only Ronaldo, and probably Messi, will get to that number, at least for a few years.
Top two goalscorers as well, even more probable.
Are this official games?
Arent all international games "official" games?
All games count for NT.
Upon my name as Godfrey
Neymar is catching up. There is a good chance, by the end of their careers, the top 3 will be Ronaldo, Messi and Neymar.
Neymar's decline has already started. I HIGHLY doubt he's gonna get close.
Never. He is too often injured and Brazil doesn't get easy fixtures
Odds are he’ll retire before Ronaldo
I hope ali mabkhout becomes in the top 5,
Date of 50th goal seems like an odd stat to bother listing...what does it show? How does it help with anything? It's not age at 50th goal or number of caps to 50, it's just the date...
It's from the "List of men's footballers with 50 or more international goals" wiki page hence they added a date of the 50th goal.
Cristiano Ronaldo is aging like a fine wine 🍷
Ronaldo only scoring his 50th goal at the age of 29 is crazy to still end up the highest
C. Ronaldo has over 400 goals after turning 30. He has scored more goals after turning 30 than most of the best strikers during their whole career... (Ronaldo, Raul, Van nistelrooy etc..)
Ronaldo after 30: over 400+ goals, 2 Ballon D'ors, 2x FIFA best, Euro 2016, championships in Spain and Italy, three Champions League back to back
Messi after 30: 250+ goals, 3 Ballon D'ors, World Cup 2022 win, 1x FIFA best.
Most players start going downhill after 30 these mfs doubled up on their individual awards and achievements
Puskas 0.94 goals per game is insane not even Messi or Ronaldo are averaging that much internationally
Chitalu's and Dahari's deaths are both very sad. Chitalu died at 45 on 27th April 1993 when a plane carrying the Zambian national team crashed in the ocean, 30 people total died. Dahari was diagnosed with motor neurone disease and died 3 years later of muscular dystrophy at age 37 on 11th July 1991.
Mokhtar is his given name
I don't know why, but is there a problem in CAF? How come we don't have prolific goal scorers?
205 caps is mad, that record will probably stay for a loong time. (if it is a record, im not sure but you’d think it is)
He was going toe to toe with a player from Kuwait I think, but seems the latter slowed down.
EDIT: his name is Bader Al-Mutawa and he has 196 caps but the last was in June 2022, probably won't reach Ronaldo.
I do think international goals hold less weight these days, due to the amount of games played. Especially European nations playing the likes of San Marino, Luxembourg, Andorra etc more often.
Super Mokh!
My GOAT sunil chettri is not top3 players of all time anymore. Pains.
